


Creepy Doll

by PilgrimKitty



Category: Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Dolls, Gen, Ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-29
Updated: 2012-07-29
Packaged: 2017-11-10 23:11:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/471768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PilgrimKitty/pseuds/PilgrimKitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry Dresden finds a creepy doll that immediately takes a shine to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Creepy Doll

**Author's Note:**

> This little ficlet was written for a Tumblr prompt months ago. The prompt was simply "Harry finds a creepy doll that immediately takes a shine to him." So, here you go. This is my first Dresden Files fic, so I don't feel like I nails the characterizations yet. It is mildly inspired by the song "Creepy Doll" by Jonathon Coulton.

“Hell’s bells, Molly, are you taking over my whole apartment?” Harry grumbled as Molly set down the big cardboard box next to Harry’s favorite comfy chair.

“Sorry, Boss, but Mom’s on a garage sale rampage and if I want any of my stuff to stay my stuff I have to stow it somewhere safe. I promise I’ll bring everything back home next week when the sale’s over and my knick-knacks are no longer in danger,” Molly insisted, giving Harry her best wounded puppy look.

“Oh, alright. But if this stuff stays more than two weeks _I’ll_ sell it,” Harry told his apprentice.

“You’re the best!” she squealed, kissing him on the cheek, then running into the tiny kitchen to whip up something that might possibly count as lunch, but was more likely to deserve the title “hazardous waste.”

Mouse padded over to the box to start sniffing around but as soon as he determined that nothing qualified as food he followed the lanky girl into the kitchen to wait dutifully for her to drop something mostly edible on the floor.

Mister jumped down from his perch on the bookshelf, investigated the box and hissed angrily. The cat’s reaction startled Harry so he wandered over to the box to examine it more closely. At the very top of the box was a china doll with a small crack on one cheek, a missing eye, and some very tattered curls.

“Padawan, what’s with the creepy doll?” Harry asked, pulling the doll off the box. He heard a rattle inside its hollow head and realized he’d located the missing glass eye.

“That’s Portia,” Molly said sticking her head out of the kitchen. ”She was my favorite doll as a child. Mom wanted to throw her out, but I couldn’t let her.”

“She looks like she’s been to hell and back,” Harry mused.

“Oh, I went through a phase of carrying her around by the hair when I was little. I’m lucky she’s so intact. All of Alicia’s porcelain dolls got their faces smashed in, and Mom and Dad won’t even by the girls china dolls anymore after Hope’s first one.”

“I never understood why people would make kids toys that weren’t meant to be actually played with,” Harry mused as he set the doll back down. Harry heard the smash of a broken dish in the kitchen and rushed out of the living room.

~

Mickey Mouse woke Harry way earlier than Harry would have liked. He stretched his back, long arms above his head and yawned. He stepped out of bed and yelped.

Portia the one-eyed doll was leaning against his doorframe staring at him. Harry picked the doll up, stomped out into the living room, and dropped the doll unceremoniously back into Molly’s box. He glared at Mouse as he headed back to the bathroom to take a shower.

“Not funny,” he told his dog. He knew, of course, that dolls couldn’t walk on their own, so Mouse was the likely suspect. Mouse whined at Harry’s accusation, but Harry was already closing the bathroom door behind him.

~

When Harry left the bathroom he nearly tripped over the doll. He grumbled to himself, glared at Mouse again, and put the doll back in the box. Then he got dressed and got ready to go to the office. He was supposed to be meeting a client in an hour. He fed Mouse and Mister, grabbed a can of coke and some cheerios and filled his belly. Then he clipped Mouse’s leather lead on him and left for the day.

~

When Harry and Mouse came back inside after a long day, Harry almost didn’t notice the doll at first. But then he did. She was sprawled next to the trapdoor, her tiny china fingers pressed next to the latch, as if she was trying to get into the sub-basement.

“I think I owe you an apology,” Harry told his dog, who had been with him all day.

Mouse sneezed.

Harry picked the doll up, opened the trap door and went down into his lab.

“Bob, wakey wakey. I’ve got an intruder and I want you to tell me what it is.”

The skull’s eyelights blinked on.

“Harry?” 

“This doll of Molly’s. It’s been moving around the apartment on it’s own. What is it?”

The skull stared at the doll.

“Awww, she likes you!” Bob declared.

“Huh?” Harry asked.

“Look at the doll’s hair, boss,” Bob instructed. Harry studied the doll.

“Is this real human hair?” Harry asked.

“Yeah. That’s an antique doll. Dolls used to be made in the image of the girls they were being made for. Oftentimes they’d be made with the girl’s real hair. My guess is the girl died young, and part of her spirit was trapped in the doll. And she has a crush on you!” Bob laughed.

“A child’s spirit is trapped in this doll?” Harry asked.

“Yep,” Bob replied.

“How do I set her free?”

“Burning the doll should do it. It’ll release the connection and the spirit can move on.” 

“I should probably tell Molly before I burn her favorite childhood toy,” Harry mused.

“Do I get to meet the cookie now?” Bob asked excitedly.

“No!” Harry said, “Shut up, Bob.”

~

“This sucks,” Molly said. ”I don’t know what’s creepier, that I spent my childhood playing with a little kid’s ghost, or that the doll started following you around the apartment.”

“Are you sure it never did any of that when you were little?” Harry asked.

“Who knows?” Molly asked. ”With all my family, nothing ever stays where it belongs.”

“Good point. You wanna do the honors, Padawan?” Harry asked.

“Bye, Portia,” Molly said, tossing the doll into the fireplace. She leaned into Harry slightly as she bid the doll farewell, a tear sliding down her cheek. She really loved that doll.

Then the doll raised a hand from inside the fire, and waved at them.

Molly screamed.

*!*


End file.
